


the moon is down

by sylwrites



Series: Holiday Vignettes [2]
Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Thanksgiving
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-13
Updated: 2017-11-19
Packaged: 2019-02-01 21:31:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12713343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sylwrites/pseuds/sylwrites
Summary: Jughead’s voice, insistent and forlorn, interrupts her.“Betty,”he says, his tone laced with desperation. “Four and Twenty is out of pumpkin pie.”..In which hosting Thanksgiving for two people turns out to be a lot more trouble than Betty bargained for.two- shot; AU.





	1. one

**Author's Note:**

  * For [onceuponamirror](https://archiveofourown.org/users/onceuponamirror/gifts).



**the moon is down**

 

 _All my life I’ve watched you dance along_  
_To music I can’t hear_ _  
I ain’t equipped to hear those songs_

  * Radical Face



  
  


Betty rests her forearms on the top bar of her shopping cart and turns to face the wall of bell peppers beside her, wincing as the movement stretches her sore back. Turning forward again, she pulls the crumpled grocery list out of her pocket and casts her eyes down at it as her feet begin to slowly shuffle the cart toward the lettuce. She still needs a head of romaine and a couple of sweet potatoes for dinner, plus some bananas for her morning smoothies, and then she can go home and start cooking her pitiful psuedo-Thanksgiving dinner.

 

She’s trying to decide between identical heads of lettuce when her cell phone rings. Betty tugs it out, curious to know who in this day and age has the need to actually _call_ her, and rolls her eyes when she sees Jughead’s name on the caller ID.

 

“Hey Jug,” she answers, balancing her phone between her cheek and shoulder as she reaches for the winning head of romaine. “I’m just about done getting groceries, then I’ll be home and start preparing the--”

 

Jughead’s voice, insistent and forlorn, interrupts her. _“Betty,”_ he says, his tone laced with desperation. “Four and Twenty is out of pumpkin pie.”

 

Betty pauses with the lettuce halfway to the cart. “What?”

 

“Four and Twenty Blackbirds,” he clarifies. “The bakery. It’s _out of pie._ We can’t have Thanksgiving without pumpkin pie.”

 

Oh. _Jesus Christ,_ she thinks. “Just get it somewhere else, then,” she says, moving toward the sweet potatoes and then placing three in the top of the cart. She doesn’t have time for this today. She’s already about an hour behind in her shopping for the Thanksgiving dinner she’s cooking for herself and Jughead, who is the only other person in her close friend circle besides herself that is stuck staying in the city for the holiday.

 

She is an economic hostage, having worked late to make a deadline for her latest article and then not felt like taking the train home to be judged by her parents for fifteen hours before needing to turn around and go back to the city for work again. Jughead’s isolation is self-imposed, having turned down the annual offer to go home with Archie because this year, the Andrews men were headed to Chicago to see Archie’s mother.

 

(“Thanksgiving isn’t important to me, Betty. I’m fine staying here. Promise.”)

 

Of course, he’d jumped at her offer to cook a mini-Thanksgiving dinner for the two of them, because even if Betty isn’t going home to see her parents, she’s not depriving herself of stuffing. Not now and not ever. In fact, without her mother around to count her calories, she’s going to eat a double serving. Eating alone _had_ felt a little sad, but knowing Jughead was on board had been more comforting. Especially once she’d declared she didn’t have time to bake a pie and if he wanted one he was going to have to go out and find one himself.

 

“I can’t, Betty, Four and Twenty is the only place that makes pumpkin pie that’s as good as yours is.”

 

“That’s too bad, Jug,” Betty replies absentmindedly, grabbing a bunch of bananas and heading toward the till. “Guess we just won’t have pie.”

 

A sad groan comes across the speaker, the connection splitting for a second so that it sounds even more pronounced. “It’s not Thanksgiving without _pie.”_

 

“Nowhere in the five boroughs has pumpkin pie, Jughead, seriously?”

 

“Not as good as yours, like I said.” There’s a pause on the line, and when he speaks next, Jughead’s voice is softer and slower. “Betty, will you please--”

 

 _“No.”_ Betty cuts him off. “You knew the arrangement. I’m not baking this year.”

 

“I’ll watch _Mean Girls,”_ Jughead puts in quickly. “And _Heathers._ And I won’t complain the entire time. I promise.”

 

She stops two feet from the checkout line. Fuck. That’s tempting. She _always_ wants to watch _Mean Girls,_ and even though Jughead is usually up for any kind of movie-plus-discussion combo, he’s so far refused to engage in a girl-clique marathon and comparison despite her numerous requests. This would be a rare opportunity indeed.

 

Plus, he does sound desperate. _“Please.”_

 

Betty gives a heavy sigh, hauls the full cart toward her slightly, and swings it around to go find the baking aisle. “Yeah, okay.”

  


* * *

  


When she’d originally decided to cook a mini-Thanksgiving dinner for herself and Jughead, Betty had anticipated two things. One was that she’d have to plan for four people and not two, in order to properly accommodate her childhood friend’s extraordinary appetite. That was fine. She’d shopped accordingly.

 

She would have to start cooking earlier than Jughead’s arrival so that she could avoid the _other_ thing she’d anticipated - his hovering.

 

Betty had wanted a pet growing up, finding it sort of charming how dogs were always underfoot when their humans were cooking in the kitchen. _Please drop something, please drop something, please drop something,_ their cute furry faces said. Archie’s dog Vegas was particularly bad for this, and while Betty could see how it would get annoying, a part of her also found it hopelessly adorable and endearing.

 

Jughead’s behaviour seems to be at least partly inspired by that same sentiment - _if I’m around, maybe I can eat something -_ but there’s something significantly less tolerable about it. Betty’s not sure why; Jughead isn’t a particularly annoying person, at least not with her. He’s always been a great friend, there when he was needed and surprisingly aware of when he was _not,_ like when she was having debilitating menstrual cramps before Vixens practice in high school and really just needed Veronica’s endless supply of Midol. He’s always been appropriately respectful of not mentioning her ill-conceived childhood crush on Archie, too, especially now that it’s incredibly obvious how perfect he is for Veronica and how terrible they would’ve been together. A lesser person would have teased her, potentially, but not Jughead.

 

 _Still,_ Betty is beyond irritated by the way that he _hovers,_ peeking over her shoulder like he’s fucking Gordon Ramsay or something. Once, when she’d been making chili for the group, he’d told her to add a little more onion powder, and she’d been overcome with the sudden urge to stomp on his foot.

 

The worst part about the situation was that he’d ended up being right, and in the process of her annoyance Betty had somehow forgotten to add _any_ onion powder at all, leaving the taste just slightly off. And therein is the real problem, the one she only acknowledges to herself sometimes, usually late at night - he’s too goddamn distracting.

 

He’s too tall, too warm, and he smells too much like a delicious mixture of dust and Old Spice. His hair is too long and floppy (whenever she’s lucky enough to see it out of the beanie, anyway), his limbs are too lanky, and his smart mouth is too full and soft-looking for Betty’s comfort. She can’t stand him speaking over her shoulder anymore, not with his lips that close to her ear and his tongue that quick.

 

She just does not have the time in her day to be developing a _thing_ for Jughead. Not at fucking all.

 

Unfortunately, it seems to be happening anyway, so Betty had taken extra steps to ensure that it didn’t get any worse during this Thanksgiving meal. She’d specifically planned to have the chicken roasting in the oven, the stuffing made, and the potatoes ready to cook _before_ Jughead arrived with the store-bought pie, because that only left the salad to prepare and if there was one thing Jughead wasn’t interested in picking at pieces of, it was salad.

 

But now that she’s agreed to make a pie for him, he’s come over to her apartment earlier than planned. She’s rolling the dough for a crust, and he’s standing right beside her with a half-grin on his stupid, angular face, _hovering._

 

“That smells so good, Betts.”

 

 _Stop._ “It smells like unbaked pie crust dough, Jug, not even you could find that appealing.”

 

Jughead chuckles. It’s a soft, sort of unfamiliar sound, and Betty is most definitely _not_ into how cute it is. “I like the smell of flour. It promises tasty things. Especially if you’re behind them.” He squeezes her shoulder, then grabs a box of Oreos that Betty had put out specifically to distract him and hops onto the counter with his hand already buried inside.

 

She can’t help but smile at his compliment. “Thanks, Juggie.”

 

He pops a cookie in his mouth. “You making the pie is even better than if Four and Twenty had one.”

 

Betty raises an eyebrow at him faux-suspiciously. “Are you sure they were out?” she asks as she turns away to find her pie plate. She pauses with her eyes fixed on the top of the fridge, trying to remember where she’d stored it after its last use, and gives a mental groan when she realizes that it’s in the top cabinet, borderline unreachable. She bends over to get the folding step-stool out from beneath the sink, wincing briefly at the angle it forces her back into, then sets it up below the top cabinet.

 

She’s already got both feet on the stool when an arm wraps around her waist from behind and lifts her back to the ground. “What do you think you’re doing?” Jughead asks, amusement clear in his voice. “Let me get it, Betts.”

 

“I could’ve reached it,” Betty says, mildly annoyed not by the ease with which Jughead procures the pie plate but by the tingles on the skin of her abdomen where his hand had made contact.

 

“Perks of having a tall friend,” he says, handing her the plate. “Besides, your back clearly still hurts,” he adds, giving her a pointed look that Betty glances away from with mild shame. “You told me it was better.”

 

She shrugs and turns away, busying herself with pressing the flat dough into the plate. She’d slipped on some early-winter ice on the way to Jughead and Archie’s apartment a week prior, and the impact of her fall had jarred her back more than she was willing to admit. “It _will_ be better,” she comments casually. “I just also fell asleep in my desk chair last night finishing up an article, and that aggravated it a bit.”

 

Jughead leans against the counter beside her, his arms folded and his face contorted in concern. “Betty…”

 

“I know, I know, don’t burn the midnight oil. Rich coming from you,” she says accusingly, because as a full-time novelist and part-time bartender, Jughead keeps hours that can be most generously described as unconventional.

 

“I’m just worried about you. You look tired.”

 

Betty glances up at him. “Words a girl loves to hear.”

 

Jughead sighs and rubs a hand across his face. It’s his turn for mild annoyance to cross his features. “That’s _not_ what I mean. You _know_ I think you’re gorgeous-”

 

“You do?” she blurts, the words falling out before she can stop herself. Yeah, maybe she’s newly hyper-aware of his attractiveness, but she’d assumed that her appearance to him was irrelevant at best. It was part of why she was currently wearing torn leggings and an old t-shirt instead of anything that would have signalled an effort being made - it didn’t seem worth it.

 

For his part, Jughead looks taken aback by her surprise. “Are you serious?”

 

Betty swallows. “What?”

 

“That surprises you? That I think you’re beautiful?”

 

“I think the word you used was _gorgeous,_ but-”

 

“Betty.” His voice is unexpectedly stern, and Betty can feel nerves rising in her chest at the piercing look in his blue eyes.

 

She glances away, unable to hold his gaze, and shrugs nonchalantly. “I didn’t think you saw - I mean, we’ve known each other for so long, I always figured you saw me as a genderless blob.” The pie crust is ready for filling now, and she reaches for the mashed pumpkin, brown sugar, and spices that she’d set aside earlier.

 

“Is that how you see _me?”_ Jughead presses.

 

The filling looks far too orange for her liking. Needs more brown sugar. “No,” she answers quietly.

 

Betty reaches for a spatula to even out the filling, but Jughead’s hand encircles her wrist before she can pick one up. He tugs ever-so-slightly, and her eyes lift to his despite the uncertainty in her chest.

 

They’re wide and honest but darker than usual. “Believe me, Betty,” he says, stepping toward her and dropping his hand from her arm. “I definitely know you’re a woman.”

 

She’s terrified to keep staring at him, but for some reason Betty can’t force herself to look away either. There’s a new expression on his face, something specific and unreadable, and _god,_ she’s never been more attracted to him as she is in this moment.

 

“Okay,” she finally says, squeaky and far more breathy than she’d intended.

 

He swallows and takes a step back, seemingly satisfied by whatever that interaction had brought him. “Okay.”

  
  
  


The pie goes in the oven when the chicken comes out a little while later, and Betty busies herself with carving it and making plates up for herself and Jughead. They eat at her little kitchen table, the conversation having mercifully reverted back to its normal pace. Afterward, while the pie cools on the counter, Betty goes to the living room to set up _Mean Girls._

 

Jughead follows. “Dinner was incredible, Betty. I expected nothing less, but you really outdid yourself this time.”

 

She smiles over her shoulder at him as she’s picking the movie out of her Netflix queue. “Thanks, Juggie. I appreciate you joining. Thanksgiving would’ve been a little sad by myself.”

 

“When have I ever let a friend eat alone?” Jughead jokes, falling onto the couch gracelessly.

 

Betty laughs. “Not your M.O., for sure,” she agrees, sitting down beside him and smiling. “Ready to watch?”

 

He makes a big show out of groaning and shuffling in his seat, then whips his head around to grin at Betty. “I’ve been waiting my whole life for this!” he says, feigning excitement. “Tina Fey is truly the Mark Twain of our time, and all that.”

 

She pushes at his arm. “Don’t be an ass.”

 

“What was that? You like my ass?” Jughead teases.

 

Betty rolls her eyes. “I might, if you had one,” she says lightly, clucking her tongue in a way that reminds her horribly of her own mother.

 

Jughead’s arm slides around Betty’s back, his hand settling at the curve of her waist. He pulls her gently toward him, and she gives in like the cuddle-starved needy girl she knows herself to be. “Guess I should start doing squats,” he says, his voice rumbling in his chest beneath Betty’s cheek as she settles herself against him.

 

“Yeah, you’ll need that bubble butt for bikini season.”

 

He’s quiet for a moment, and when Betty lifts her head to glance at him, she finds him grinning down at her. “Sorry, was just thinking about bikinis.”

 

“Jug!” Betty exclaims, swatting at his arm. “What’s gotten into you today? Have you turned into Archie?”

 

Jughead tightens his arm around her and he laughs somewhat awkwardly. “No, Archie’s bikini parade is endless and faceless. Mine is really, really specific.”

 

“Yeah? Anyone I know?” Betty asks with tension quickening in her stomach, now only half-watching the opening sequence of _Mean Girls_ playing on the screen.

 

There’s the faintest touch of pressure on the top of her head, and when she looks up, her eyes meet with Jughead’s. He looks conflicted, his lips parted slightly in concentration. “Yeah,” he says finally, visibly swallowing. “Someone you know.”

 

Betty tilts her head slowly, her eyes searching his face for lines to read. The bags under his eyes are less pronounced today, and he looks hopelessly like he did when he was sixteen. She smiles, watches him return it, and then before she can overthink it, she kisses him.

 

She pulls back after a second. His face breaks into a wide grin, he mutters, “Thank God,” and then he’s tugging her back in.

 

  
  
  
(They forget the pie.)

 

.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not really even sure what this is; I'm trying to get my groove back, haha, so it's a bit of an experiment. 
> 
> Please let me know if you liked it.


	2. two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An alternate POV, for my dear onceuponamirror.

 

 _you look like you smell of_  
_honey and no pain  
let me have a taste of that_

  * Rupi Kaur



  


He lays on his back on his best friend’s bedspread, performing a delicate balancing act between vaguely listening to Archie ramble on about Veronica and staring at the ceiling. In in the dim light, the ridges on the staccato popcorn that covers the ceiling look kind of like faraway mountain ranges, the kind that a Matt Damon type would be exploring in a sci-fi movie. What was the point of popcorn ceilings, anyway? Was minimalism _truly_ dead in the 1970s?

 

“Jug.”

 

He lifts his head, breaking from his reverie, and looks at Archie. “What?”

 

“I asked - you sure you don’t wanna come to Chicago for Thanksgiving? My mom won’t mind,” Archie offers, folding a shirt and placing it in a duffel bag.

 

Jughead set his head back down. “Nah, I’ll pass on the Andrews family reunion, but thanks. Tell your Mom I said hi.”

 

Archie shrugs as if to say _your loss_ and continues packing. And it _is,_ kind of - Jughead likes Thanksgiving well enough, mostly because of food, and he also likes Archie’s family. Usually he goes back home with Archie for most holidays, given that his own family is a bit _scattered,_ to put it lightly. This year, Archie and his dad are going to Chicago to visit his mother. His parents are divorced, so it’s bound to be a little uneasy, but it’s not the awkwardness that has Jughead turning down the offer. He’s fine with awkwardness. Especially Andrews family awkwardness, which is the most mundane, wholesome kind there is. Fred and Mary are painfully amicable.

 

No. There’s something else. Work, a little bit - he has a shitload of writing to do, and going home with Archie basically just means he’ll spend four days sleeping, eating, and playing video games. But also…

 

“You sure you’re not just staying here because _Betty_ is staying here?” Archie teases, placing a wholly unnecessary emphasis on their friend’s name.

 

Jughead levels him with a look. “I’m sure,” he says witheringly, but it’s at least partly a lie. Hearing that Betty had deadlines at her newspaper job that were going to preclude her from making it home for the holiday _had_ maybe slightly impacted his decision to also stay. He knows from a great amount of personal experience what it’s like to be alone on the holidays, and even though it’s just Thanksgiving, that’s not a feeling he ever wants Betty to have.

 

And yeah, fine. He has a huge goddamn crush on her, like the twelve-year-old that he is at heart. He wants to touch the beauty mark near her lip and hold her hand and pull her pigtails, so to speak. He’s had a _thing_ for her for years. He’s not going to be dramatic and say something cliche like he’s loved her for as long as he can remember, because that’s not true, but he’s always liked Betty a lot and over the years exactly what _that_ means has changed for him.

 

The crush is especially bad right now, because Betty is single and has been for awhile, so there’s nothing stopping him from finding his balls and asking her out. Except for the whole part where he’s pretty sure that the whole ‘childhood friendship’ thing has placed him firmly in a separate group of people that are all decidedly unromantic. Plus, she’s incredibly out of his league in every possible way that she can be.

 

But that doesn’t matter. He’s not staying and hanging out with Betty on Thanksgiving because of some sad hopefulness that she’ll lose her mind at some point and fuck him. That’s not the kind of guy he is. Truly, he likes her company, and he wants her to have _someone_ to spend the holiday with.

 

And really, going to Chicago wouldn’t be nearly as relaxing as going home to Riverdale. It would be a _trip,_ something he’d have to make _plans_ about, and that is absolutely not what Thanksgiving is about in his mind. If he can gorge himself on Betty’s cooking and then lay around at his apartment in sweatpants, it’ll be a successful night.

 

* * *

 

 

It’s his job to buy pie, but the only place in the greater-NYC area that he trusts more than Pop’s or Betty’s homemade pie is out of it when he gets there. The girl at the front counter looks apologetic, but Jughead’s world has basically ended over this and her pitying eyes are not helpful enough.

 

His sadness _is_ enough to convince Betty to make him a pie, even though she’d sworn up and down that she wasn’t baking any desserts, and all he has to do is sit through a couple of teen-girl dramas that she loves. It’s a small price to pay for pumpkin pie, even though he really doesn’t want to have to discuss the merits of _Mean Girls_ versus _Heathers_ afterward. He already knows he’ll have far too many opinions than is appropriate for an adult man to have about the dynamics of female friendships in high school.

 

(Although the movies are not entirely without merit; _Heathers_ has young Winona Ryder, and _Mean Girls_ has pre-drugs-and-alcohol Lindsay Lohan. That’ll help.)

 

Any thoughts of Lindsay Lohan die in his brain as soon as Jughead arrives at Betty’s apartment to help with the cooking, because she’s wearing a shrunken well-worn t-shirt so threadbare that he can plainly see the floral strap of her bra through the fabric and a pair of leggings that he already knows are going to do absolutely nothing to quell his crush. Over top is a cute little apron that says _your opinion wasn’t in the recipe_ and he can’t help but wonder if it’s a dig at his culinary demands.  

 

“Hey Betts,” he says, dropping a six-pack of beer on the counter and accepting the hug hello that she offers. “I like your apron.”

 

“I wore it for you,” she says dryly. “Thanks for bringing drinks.”

 

“No problem. Plus, since Veronica isn’t here we don’t even need to fake that we like wine.”

 

Betty giggles and goes to wash her hands in the sink. “That’s true. What are you going to do with your extra eight dollars?”

 

Jughead hops onto the countertop that he’s pretty sure she isn’t using, the one that doesn’t have any flour or rolling pins, and clasps his hands together greedily. “I think I’ll travel,” he muses, putting on an exaggerated air of self-importance. “Really discover myself.”

 

“You can make it all the way to Queens with that kind of money,” Betty observes. “That’ll teach you something about yourself.”

 

He grins. “Have I told you yet that you’re my favourite?”

 

Her cheeks flush pink. She’s always been horrible at taking compliments, even joking ones like his is, and instead of making him happy the whole concept just bums him out. Betty is a fucking goddess, smart and kind and funny and beautiful, and the idea that her mother has permanently taken away her ability to recognize that about herself is just depressing.

 

“That’s just because I’m cooking for you,” she says, glancing at him quickly.

 

“That might be one of the reasons,” Jughead allows, watching her move around the kitchen. “How’s your back?” he asks, concerned. She’d hurt it after taking an unfortunate spill on the ice a week prior, and fine, maybe he’s a little worried. She’d been on her way to his apartment, and when she’d arrived she’d had a scraped knee and the unmistakeable traces of now-dried tears on her cheeks.

 

“It’s better,” she says, measuring out a few cups of flour carefully. “Do you want to start tearing lettuce for the salad?”

 

“Yes ma’am,” he says, mock-saluting her and then jumping off the countertop.

 

He obediently tears a head of romaine, slowly so as to make each piece relatively similar in size to the next, and tosses it gradually into Betty’s IKEA salad spinner. Afterward, he watches Betty roll the dough for a pie crust, and catches her mid-wince as she bends to get a stool from underneath the sink. He _knew_ it.

 

Jughead takes the opportunity to push back on her I-can-deal-with-it heroics, coming up behind her and lifting her easily off of the stool she’d just procured. He doesn’t know why she feels the need to absorb every possible inconvenience that comes their way - he’d begged for the pie, sure, but he’s right here and has nearly a head of height on her, so there’s no reason she needs to try to reach the pie plate herself.

 

(Plus, this way he gets to put his arm around her for a couple of seconds. She’s light and soft, and he has the brief, inappropriate thought that it would be _so easy_ to carry her to the bedroom if the opportunity ever presented itself, and it takes all of his willpower to force that thought back down to the recesses of his mind.)

 

There’s a bit of a moment not long after where he knows he’s gone too far, stepping fully into her personal space to tell her that _yes Betty I know you’re a woman,_ because apparently she’s under some kind of impression that not only is he unaware of that fact, but he’s blind to how incredibly gorgeous she is, and Jughead cannot live in a world where Betty doesn’t know that. On the upside, she doesn’t seem disgusted by his flirtation, so Jughead counts that as a win.

 

They eat about an hour later, once the bird is out of the oven and the potatoes are mashed and ready, and Jughead is pretty sure he’s in heaven.

 

“If you ever want to make money on the side, I’m pretty sure I could get Archie to agree to pay you to cook every meal for us,” he suggests, his mouth half-full of stuffing.

 

Betty cuts a piece of chicken carefully and spears it with her fork. “I’ll keep that in mind for if this whole journalist thing doesn’t go well,” she informs him. “But thank you.”

 

“I think this is what I always imagined Thanksgiving dinner is supposed to taste like,” he continues, swallowing his bite of food. “Fred’s not a bad cook, but he’s no Julia Child.”

 

“Your parents never cooked, before…” she trails off, suddenly looking embarrassed, and shakes her head at herself. “Sorry, you don’t have to answer that, that’s none of my business.”

 

Jughead quirks an eyebrow. It’s sweet of her to feel bad for him, but he’s long since past mourning the loss of holiday non-traditions past in the Jones household. “Before my family disintegrated, you mean?” he finishes, giving her a half-smile. “It’s okay, Betts. It’s a normal question. And no, not really. My mom - well, she was never really much of a cook. And I don’t think she married him for _his_ culinary skills.”

 

Betty bites her lip. “No?”

 

“No, I’m halfway sure she just did it to spite her parents.”

 

“Ah, the ultimate rebellion - marry a hot biker guy with a tattoo.”

 

Jughead snorts at her words and has to cough water into his napkin before he can speak. He meets her eyes once his throat is cleared and raises his eyebrows as high as they’ll go. “Did you just say my dad is hot?”

 

She looks evasive at first, then there’s a flash of something akin to _ah-whatever,_ and she shrugs. “Yeah, maybe.” She winks at him exaggeratedly and grins. “Don’t worry Juggie, you got his genes, though you _are_ a bit less Billy Loomis and a little more Jack Dawson. In a good way.”

 

It’s his turn to blush now, his ears heating up and betraying his otherwise perpetually-cool exterior. “Thanks, Betts.” It’s one thing to hear that he’s cute from the girl Archie had made him go on two dates with last year, and another thing altogether to hear it from _Betty._

 

The rest of dinner goes by quickly, and they clean up in record time so that the _Mean Girls_ marathon can start. Jughead gets two seconds in before he decides to throw caution to the wind and tug Betty into his side, which she mercifully seems to embrace.

 

And then, two minutes after _that,_ she kisses him.

 

He’s not trying to be a bag of cliches, but Jughead’s pretty sure he sees the proverbial stars when she does it, and he pulls her in for another one almost immediately after the first kiss breaks. Her apron is gone now, laying on the back of one of the kitchen chairs, and _holy shit, he’s kissing Betty Cooper._

 

“Yeah, you are,” she breathes, giggling at him quietly when the kiss breaks, and it’s then that he realizes he’s been speaking out loud.

 

He’d blush, but Betty’s leaning up against his side and her lips are a little bruised because _he did that!,_ and he no longer gives a shit about shame. “You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do this,” he tells her instead, pressing another kiss to her mouth.

 

Betty grabs his wrist and forces his hand from his lap onto her waist. “Well, _you_ have no idea how crazy you were driving me in the kitchen,” she says breathlessly. “Standing so close and not touching me.”

 

Jughead’s hand immediately tightens, the other still wrapped around her side. “I didn’t know you wanted me to,” he says, his eyes searching her face.

 

She visibly swallows, then her lips part again and she nods slowly. “For a while now,” she confesses, a muscle in her chin twitching with nervousness.

 

He feels like he’s dreaming, but when he leans in to kiss the look of anxiety off her face she kisses back, and _that’s_ definitely real. Her tongue pokes at his lips until he parts them, then the kiss deepens and he hauls her into his lap. Jughead caresses the sides of her waist, rubbing his thumbs at the base of her ribcage, and grins into Betty’s kiss when she arches her chest purposefully at him.

 

He doesn’t need to be told twice. His right hand moves upward, first ghosting over the curve of her breast gingerly and then squeezing fully when Betty whines at his touch. His palms drop to her thighs briefly, intending to lose a bit of the nervous moisture they’ve built up. The break is just long enough for Betty to lean back and lift her top off, revealing the nude-coloured bra with the embroidered floral straps that he’d admired earlier through her thin shirt.

 

He’s seen her in a bikini, of course, and in terms of the skin she’s showing, there’s not much variance. It’s the same smooth abdomen and small waist that he’d first seen years ago, the same delicate collarbone, the same full breasts. But this time, things are different; this time, she’s sitting on top of him, attached at the lips, pulling at his own shirt.

 

Jughead obeys, breaking the kiss so that Betty can pull his shirt off. “Betty, I-”

 

She pauses with her mouth halfway to his neck, eyes dark, her chest flushed and moving rapidly with her breath. “What?”

 

He shakes his head. “Nothing, just - is this when I tell you how incredibly beautiful you are, or-”

 

“Anytime,” Betty interrupts, pressing a kiss to his lips and dragging his hand to the back clasp of her bra. “You can tell me that anytime.”

 

He flicks it open after a few fumbling attempts, then watches her slide the straps off her arms, enraptured. It’s the closest thing to a religious experience he thinks he’s ever had, and shit, he’d go to this church every day.

 

Her breasts are perfect, just as he’d always thought they’d be, and the noise she makes when he takes the peak of one into his mouth is pretty damn perfect, too. He feels personally offended by the idea that Betty has wanted him to do this for ‘a while now’, because regardless of how long ‘a while’ is, he’s pretty sure it’ll overlap with how long _he’s_ wanted to do this.

 

“Do you want to slow down?” Jughead mumbles against her skin, fully aware of how ridiculous it is for him to be asking that question while her fingers are snapping open the top button of his jeans.

 

Betty pauses and tugs him back from her chest by his hair. “Do _you?”_ she asks.

 

He shakes his head, his mind fuzzy and preoccupied by the fact that all of his nerve endings are on high alert. “No,” he says, “but Betty, I really like you a _lot,_ just - just so you know.”

 

She smiles at him and lets out a giggle, then presses a kiss to his forehead. “Oh Juggie,” she sighs. “I like you a lot too. Believe me, I have no intention of this being a one-time thing.”

 

“Good,” he says, and kisses her.

  
  
  


(Afterward, as he lay in the hazy darkness of Betty’s bedroom with her wrapped around him, a horrible thought dawns.

 

 _“Betty,”_ Jughead says urgently, poking at her bare shoulder. “We didn’t eat the pie.”)

 

**fin**


End file.
